


Signals That Sound in the Dark

by dadlands



Category: Metal Gear
Genre: F/F, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, More tags to be added, Psychic Abilities, brief emetophobia in the very beginning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-29
Updated: 2017-12-29
Packaged: 2019-02-23 18:54:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13196436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dadlands/pseuds/dadlands
Summary: Hal Emmerich, thirteen, has nightmares. He thinks that they're just nightmares, nothing more, until he meets a powerful boy hiding in his trash can, discovers a conspiracy rooted in his town, and watches his nightmares come to life with his Dungeons and Dragons group.





	Signals That Sound in the Dark

**Author's Note:**

> brief emetophobia and mentions of huey emmerich in the beginning, overall warning for mistreatment of children referenced throughout

Hal woke up with a start, and rushed to the bathroom, hoping and wishing that his mom couldn’t hear him from downstairs. All hope was lost, however, when, after promptly throwing up his dinner from earlier, a knock came at the door.

“Hal? Are you alright?” His mom called. “I’m going to come in, okay?”

Hal mumbled an alright, and he saw the silhouette of his mother against the gentle light of the hall in the doorway from his prone position on the floor.

His mother, eyes hidden behind her glasses, wearing loose pajamas and holding a book, stooped down next to him, and put a hand on his forehead. “You’re not running a fever,” she said, and gently propped him up against the wall. “Do you feel any better?”

Hal nodded, the restless sleep he had gotten fading from his eyes and allowing him to think clearly. The images of his nightmare came back, one by one, afterwards, and he found himself hyperventilating and holding himself over the toilet as he retched, his mother rubbing his back.

“Anxious?” She asked, simply, and Hal nodded again. “About school?”

Hal shook his head, and cleared his throat.

“Nightmare,” he said simply, and his mother furrowed her brows. “I don’t know what it was, but,” he trailed off, feeling self-conscious. He was thirteen, for heaven’s sake, he was too old to be this broken from nightmares. He leaned back against the wall and accepted the glass of water his mother offered him.

“Was it about him?” His mother said, calm but blunt, and Hal shuddered. No, for once he didn’t dream about Huey, the faded arguments he could remember as a child, the sterile labs and complicated mechanisms that occasionally came back to him from his days as a toddler.

“No,” Hal said. “Just,” he groaned, embarrassed. “Something spooky.”

_ There was a thick dust in the air, no matter where he went, almost like snow but far, far worse, far colder, and the tendrils were grabbing at his feet, and the sky was so dark, and he was being watched, he could feel it, and - _

“You’re hyperventilating, Hal. Breathe,” his mother said. “Try and match my breaths.” She breathed, loudly and deliberately, and Hal followed along, feeling the anxiety disperse slightly. They sat on the floor for a little longer, until Hal felt like he wasn’t going to retch anymore. His mom helped him up and he wished her a good night. She insisted on walking him to his bedroom and tucking him in, even though Hal protested slightly. Sal, their old grey cat, jumped up on his bed as soon as Hal was underneath the warm quilts, and meowed her arrival to both mother and son. His mother gave her a light scratch behind the ears as Hal took his glasses off and put them on his bedside table.

“Joy is coming tomorrow evening,” his mother said, and Hal smiled. Joy was his mother’s partner, and always tried to take Hal out to do things she thought were fun, like fishing, or camping. While Hal didn’t enjoy these activities all too much, Joy’s stories that she told him were almost impossible to believe. It was just like one of his Japanese animes. “So make sure the trash goes out tomorrow morning before you leave, alright?”

Hal groaned. “Yes, mom,” he said, and they exchanged “I love you”s before he turned over and went back to sleep.

Luckily, the dreams didn’t bother him for the rest of the night, and he woke up feeling refreshed and ready as he could for another day of middle school. He pushed the lunch his mother made for him into his messy backpack, and scanned over the note she had left for him.

_ Take out the trash _ was in bold, and Hal scowled as he dropped his backpack to grab the trash from the kitchen and shove it into the bin outside. After washing his hands, he poured a bowl of cereal with a unhealthy amount of sugar on top for breakfast. There were some perks of having your mother leave for work before it got light outside. He had just taken the first, sugar-laden bite when a loud yowl startled him.

Sal had gotten outside, he internally groaned. And was probably fighting with the neighbor’s cat, what was it, Rex?

He dropped the spoon next to the bowl and made his way to the back door, all while keeping his eye on the clock. If he left in fifteen minutes, he’d make it to the bus stop in time, and have time to watch five more minutes of  _ Space Battleship Yamato _ , on the VHS that Joy had gotten for him for the holidays last year. That was another thing about Joy that Hal loved - she would bring him VHS tapes of all the cool space and robot animes, and when he asked her where she got them, she would just wink.

Hal unlocked the back door with a sigh, and opened it slowly as to not scare Sal. As soon as he opened it, however, Sal dashed inside, and a rattling noise came from behind the trash bin that Hal had just thrown the garbage into not five minutes before. Had he thrown something away that was...living?

Hal took a deep breath, and steeled himself as he walked towards the trash can. It rattled again, and he jumped backwards, ready to run inside. However, he stopped himself, thinking about his cartoons and movies.

“The hero never turns around,” he whispered to himself, and walked to the trash can once more. The trash bag he had placed inside of it was on the ground, trash strewn in a two foot radius around it. Hal stared at it and the trash can before raising his hand. He grabbed the handle on the lid, counted mentally to three, and flung the bin open.

He found himself looking into the eyes of another boy.

Hal shrieked. The lid flung itself back on the top of the trash can, and Hal shrieked again as his fingers were forcibly pried from the lid.

Okay, he thought. So there was a boy in his trash can.

Hal gently placed his hand on the lid again, and tried to lift it. No such luck. Either the boy inside was incredibly strong, or it had stuck. Either way, Hal decided to try another method. He sat down next to the trash can, and knocked gently on it, and said quietly, “Hello?”

Hal really hoped none of the neighbors were watching. There was no response, so Hal knocked again. “You, uh, don’t have to talk back. I get being socially awkward! I have anxiety about that stuff, and uh,” he trailed off, wondering if there really was someone in the trash can. Hal leaned closer to it, and sure enough, he could hear breathing. Hyperventilating, almost.

“Are you hyperventilating? You can pass out from that,” Hal rambled nervously. “Uh, when I do that my mom breathes with me. I can help you breathe too, but I think you need to get out of the trash can for that!”

Still no response, but Hal could hear the hyperventilation still. He thought quickly - if there was one thing he was good at, besides listing off anime series quickly and fixing radios, it was coming up with a quick plan.

“You don’t have to, of course,” Hal backtracked. “Um, can you even hear me? You still don’t have to say anything, just, uh, knock once if you can hear me! And knock twice if you can’t, although if you can’t hear me then you won’t know -”

A knock interrupted his speech, and Hal gave a small sigh of relief. “Okay! I’m going to breathe really loudly, and then you’re gonna breathe with me. Are you ready?”

Another knock.

Hal took a deep breath in, and was satisfied to hear the boy inside follow along. He held it for a few moments, then slowly exhaled. They continued this until Hal felt quite relaxed, and he hoped that it had helped the boy in the trash can as well.

Joy had told Hal stories about children who ran away, mostly to scare him when he was younger teasingly, and also told him stories about her time in the Army when she had to hide in strange places like in closets and trash cans. Hal guessed that the boy had heard stories like these too.

“Do you want to come out now?” Hal asked quietly. “There’s no one else home, and I have food, and, uh, we could watch some anime!”

Silence for a minute, and then, a tentative knock.

Hal stood up, looked around and once he had confirmed that there were no neighbors around, slowly lifted the lid of the trash can, and made eye contact with the boy once more.

* * *

The first thing Hal noticed was how scared his eyes were, and then, how he had managed to scramble inside the house completely silently. Hal locked the back door cautiously, and looked around his living room, only to find the guest underneath the coffee table. Hal scratched the back of his neck, and looked over at the clock. The bus was leaving in five minutes. He thought quickly, wondering if he should go to school and leave the boy here. Then again, he thought, looking at the way the boy was eyeing him, Hal wasn’t sure if the boy would stay here long enough for Hal to get help if he left. And Hal’s mom had taught him that, above all, it was important to help.

Joy told him this too, and both of his mothers seemed like they had learned this lesson a very, very, difficult way.

“Do you want some cereal?” Hal asked, walking towards the coffee table. The boy scanned the room, and ran out from underneath the table into the kitchen.

Hal walked into the kitchen, and found the boy shovelling spoonfuls of Hal’s breakfast into his mouth. Hal could see him more clearly now - his head was buzzed and he was wearing a hospital gown. His legs were covered in dirt and small cuts, and his hands were similarly covered in small streaks of blood and dirt.

“It’s Cheerios,” Hal said. “With, uh, lots of sugar.”

The boy didn’t even acknowledge Hal.

“I’m Hal!” Hal said. “What’s your name?”

The boy looked up at this, but then ignored it. Hal cautiously grabbed another bowl from the cupboard, placed it on the table, and poured more cereal into it. He moved around the boy to get a spoon, and the boy watched him the entire time, until Hal raised the spoon and showed it to him. “I’m just trying to eat breakfast too,” Hal said quietly.

The boy stared at the spoon, and Hal looked at it. Before his eyes, Hal could see the spoon bending forward.

He dropped the spoon like it was made of lava, and gasped. Hal looked between the boy and the spoon now on the ground. The boy made eye contact with Hal, and wiped his nose. Hal saw more blood smeared on the back of the boy’s hand.

“Did...did you do that?” Hal whispered, picking up the spoon. The boy nodded solemnly, turned around, and went back to eating his food.

Hal walked over to the table and sat next to the boy, who was pouring more cereal into his own bowl. He skipped the sugar and began to eat more of it rapidly. Hal looked back down at the bent spoon in his hand.

“Who are you?” Hal asked quietly, in total shock. The boy stopped eating, and left his spoon in the bowl as he held out his arm. On his wrist, Hal could see a small black snake tattoo, no more than one inch long, but with simplified tongue and head visible.

“Snake,” the boy said, and Hal was surprised by the firmness of his voice.

“That’s your name?” Hal said, confused. “What’s your real name?”

Snake looked more confused that Hal felt. He stuck out his other wrist, which had a number 02 on it, and showed it to Hal.

“Number two - that doesn’t make any sense. Uh, maybe we’ll stick with Snake?” Hal suggested. Snake nodded, and took another bite of cereal.

Hal looked down at his bowl, which had definitely gotten soggy. He stirred the cheerios with the bent spoon, and looked over at Snake, who was slurping the rest of his milk.

“Are you still hungry?” Hal asked, and Snake shook his head no. Hal swung his legs awkwardly.

“Can I use your spoon?” Hal looked over at Snake, who furrowed his brows as if he was curious.

“Why?” Snake asked, and Hal was glad that his guest apparently knew more vocabulary than his own name. Or, semi-name. Code-name.

Hal held up the bent one. “I can’t really use this one,” he said with a half smile.

“Bad?” Snake asked, looking worriedly at Hal. Hal held up his other hand, trying to be soothing, but Snake backed away in his chair.

“No! Uh, not bad, it’s cool! And kind of scary, but cool!” Hal said. “I just don’t want to eat my cereal with it.”

Snake scooted forward again and stared intently at the spoon. Hal looked at the spoon as well, and saw it bending into its normal form. Snake wiped his nose again, and Hal saw fresh blood on there once more.

“Thanks,” Hal said, and finished his soggy cereal quickly. He took both bowls to the sink, and began to wash them up. Snake followed behind him, and watched. Hal noticed that Snake was at least two inches taller than he was. They looked like they were about the same age. Snake had darker hair, however, and grey-blue eyes, while Hal had silverish hair, like his mom, and blue-er eyes.

Hal turned around, and looked up at Snake. “Do you want, uh, to borrow some clothes?” Hal asked awkwardly. “Or, uh, take a shower, or something?”

Snake cocked his head, and Hal was reminded slightly of the way his neighbor’s husky acted whenever it saw Hal. “To get the dirt and, um, blood off,” Hal continued.

Snake nodded, so Hal showed him to the bathroom. “I’m going to get clothes for you,” he said. “Uh, I’ll close the door and knock when I’m back, I guess?”

Snake nodded, and turned around to look at the shower. Hal closed the door. He dashed down the hallway and looked through his dresser. All he could find that might fit Snake was a shirt that his mother had gotten for him for his birthday, that had the logo from Star Wars on it. He also dug out a pair of pajama pants that were always a little too long for him.

Hal walked down the hall, and leaned towards the door to hear if the shower was running or not. He didn’t hear running water, so he knocked on the door, and asked, “Can I come in?”

Snake gave him a muffled “yes” through the door, and Hal opened it.

Snake was standing the exact position that Hal had left him in, and he stared at Hal. Hal realized that Snake probably didn’t know how to turn his shower on. When they had visited Joy a couple years ago, Hal couldn’t figure out how to turn on her shower, either (although, her shower had been trapped in case of invaders).

“Oh! Sorry,” Hal said quickly, rushing over to the shower and turning it on. “This way for hot, and this was for cold. My mom gets mad at me if I take too long, so maybe no more than ten minutes. I’ll be in the kitchen again when you need me - uh, where you ate!” Hal said, walking towards the door. He thought of something before he left. “Uh, make sure you don’t go into the shower wearing the hospital gown, or else it’ll get wet and it’ll be -”

“I know,” Snake interrupted him, and Hal said a small “oh” before shutting the door and walking downstairs.

Hal found himself staring at the spoons again, trying to bend them. Were they faulty? They had never had issues with spontaneously bending spoons before. Maybe there was some radiation in the air?

But Snake had fixed it. Snake had seen the bent spoon, and straightened it before Hal’s very eyes. Hal grabbed his most-prized possession - his notebook - from his backpack, and sat down at the table with a pen and started writing.

He was five minutes into writing when he noticed Snake standing next to him, looking at the words intently. Hal gasped and dropped the pen in shocked, and Snake took a step backwards.

“How long have you been standing there?” Hal said, slamming the notebook shut. Snake didn’t answer, but he continued to stare at the notebook. Hal frowned.

“Do you want to look at it?” He asked. Snake looked at Hal confused, as if he didn’t understand. Hal handed the notebook to Snake, gently, and Snake gripped it in his hands.

Hal didn’t know what possessed him to let Snake hold the notebook. His own mothers weren’t allowed to look in there. The only times he had taken it out were for his Dungeons and Dragons campaign with Mei-Ling and her friends.

Snake opened the page gently, and Hal blushed as he inspected every drawing he had made of his friends characters. Snake continued to turn pages, looking, until he reached the most recent page, which had been labelled at the top, in bold letters, SNAKE.

“Me,” he said, quietly, pointing at the notes. Hal nodded.

“You’re, uh, you do interesting things! And I wanna learn more,” Hal explained quickly, fearing that he had offended Snake. “I like taking notes and doing science-”

Snake ripped the page out of the book, and gave the notebook back to Hal before he could react.

“No,” Snake said, and Hal could hear the controlled fear in his voice. “No notes. No science.”

Hal nervously looked over at Snake, who was openly glaring at the piece of paper. Hal was afraid that he might set it on fire.

“Why?” Hal asked quietly, clutching his notebook to his chest.

Snake held out his wrists again, and made eye contact with Hal.

“Bad people did this,” Snake said, in the longest sentence Hal had heard from him, “for science.”

Hal gasped. The hospital gown. The number. He looked at Snake with his eyebrows raised, and opened his mouth again.

“Were - were you, an experiment?” Hal asked, and regretted the words as soon as they came out, because Snake flinched and looked away.

“Clones,” he said quietly. “Clone number two,” he added.

Hal dropped the notebook on the table, a burning desire to ask more questions, but a need to not hurt Snake with his words again battling within him. Hal decided to change the topic. Maybe Snake would bring it up again.

“Have you seen Star Wars?” Hal blurted, eager to move on. Snake looked at him confused, and Hal took that as a no. “It’s really cool! It’s one of my favorite movies - well, my favorite movie of all time is, well, you wouldn’t know about it because it’s from Japan but I have Star Wars on VHS and let’s go watch it now!” Hal said, and tentatively grabbed Snake’s hand. Snake looked down at it, and Hal expected him to take it away, but instead, Snake gripped onto it tighter.

“Yes,” he agreed, and Hal quickly dragged Snake upstairs to his room, where he got the blankets off his bed and spread them on the floor. Snake looked at the myriad of posters Hal had lining his wall, and Hal had to restrain himself from explaining every single one. Instead, he gave Snake a pillow and turned the TV on, which blared a cartoon. Snake’s eyes grew at the sight of it, and he scooted closer to the TV.

“That’s Wondercats,” Hal said, glancing at the TV. “I don’t watch it, but I think it’s okay.”

Snake nodded, and Hal pushed the VHS tape into the player. The opening fanfare blasted, and Hal sat next to Snake before jumping up.

“I’ll get some popcorn!” Hal said, and he rushed downstairs. He quickly made the popcorn, and when he came back upstairs, he found Snake looking at the screen, with the dark spaces and the red blaster lights and the white of the trooper’s armor intensely.

Hal sat back down, and placed the popcorn in the middle of it. He took a big mouthful.

“I can basically recite this movie,” he said casually, before realizing that nobody thought that was cool and Snake probably didn’t even realize how cool it was.

The first movie passed by quickly, and Snake’s eyes lit up when Hal told him that they had the second one on VHS, too. “The third one isn’t out yet, but Joy always brings me tapes before they’re technically out, so I think she might be bringing it. Joy’s my other mother, she was in the Army and she’s coming home tonight to visit,” Hal rambled again. He froze, which got the attention of Snake, who had been reading the opening of the movie. The movie stopped as Snake looked away, and gave Hal the same questioning look he had earlier.

“Joy’s coming home today,” he whispered, and looked at the clock. “Oh no, my mom will be back soon, what are we going to do?” Hal looked back at Snake. “Do you have a home? Or can you go back to the scientists?”

The TV shut off. Hal looked at it, and then at Snake, who gave Hal a very nervous look.

“No,” he whispered. “No home. No scientists,” he said. “I can leave,” he offered, and Hal shook his head.

“No!” He exclaimed, which scared Snake a little. Hal lowered his voice. “I mean, it’s not right. I’m sure my mom can call the police and they’ll help find your family, y’know, your original one -”

The lights in Hal’s room switched off, and Snake looked even more nervous, and a little angry.

“No police,” he said again. “No sheriff. No government. I can leave,” he repeated. Hal groaned.

“Why can’t you trust the sheriff? He’s a nice guy, my mom knows him! Joy knows him, they’re really close!” Hal exclaimed. Snake shook his head faster.

“Government is looking for me,” he said quickly and frustratedly. “Sheriff will turn me in. And then,” Snake made a gun with his hands, and pointed it at his heart. “Bang.”

Hal’s eyes widened.

“Okay,” he said. “Well, that’s not going to happen. I’m not going to let the bad men take you again, okay?” Hal didn’t know how. He didn’t know the tiniest bit about fighting.

One of his friends, Meryl, did. Hal made a note to ask her tomorrow at school. Meryl could take on the government if she really wanted to.

The lights turned back on in Hal’s room, as well as the TV. The Empire Strikes Back began playing again, and Snake turned his attention to that. Hal began to look around his room. He had a pretty big closet, and there was a light in there, and he could put blankets, and it would only be for a little while because his mother would understand why they couldn’t send Snake to the police.

“Snake, you’re sneaky, right?” Hal asked. Snake nodded, still watching the movie. “Can you, uh, like avoid people?”

“Yes,” Snake said. Hal nodded, still unconvinced that he could slip past Joy.

“Could you, like, sneak past people who are trained to catch other people?” Hal asked nervously. Snake turned around to look at Hal, and Hal noticed the small drip of blood coming out of his nose.

“I escaped,” Snake said, and Hal had his answer. While Snake watched The Empire Strikes Back, Hal got to putting blankets and another pillow in the closet, as well as putting a good amount of manga and books in there as well. He ran downstairs and stole some granola bars, and filled up two things of water. Hal felt bad for Snake, but he’d only have to stay in the closet as long as Joy was anywhere near his room. He loved his mom, but she didn’t have the same skills in assessment and target location as Joy did. During the day, he could watch all of Hal’s VHS tapes.

Hal walked back upstairs to see that Snake had paused the movie on the part where Luke was making rocks float. He was staring intently at the VHS tape of A New Hope, which was floating two feet above the ground.

“The Force,” Snake announced, completely deadpan.

Hal dropped the water bottles and granola bars in shock.

The door downstairs opened, and Hal’s mom announced, “Hal?”

The VHS tape dropped, and Snake grabbed the water bottles and granola and slipped into the closet before Hal could register what was happening.

Hal bit his lip, looking at the closet door, which looked the same as ever. Only Hal knew that Snake was behind the door.

“Hal!” A different voice exclaimed, and Hal stiffened when he realized it was Joy.

After all, it wasn’t a matter of if Joy, formerly known as The Boss, figured out that Hal was keeping an escaped government experiment, and more importantly a friend, in his closet.

It was a matter of when.

**Author's Note:**

> snake's verbal ability is somewhat based on eleven but is more heavily based on my own experiences with being semi-verbal due to trauma  
> strangelove needs a better name, better life, better ending, hideo kojima please fight me  
> basically everyone will appear in this fic eventually  
> title is from neutral milk hotel


End file.
